Warner Sells MP3s at Amazon at FISTFULAYEN

Warner Sells MP3s at Amazon

No DRM

It’s official, the way you buy music in the future is in MP3 format from Amazon.

Warner Music Group has announced delivery of its entire digital catalog in MP3 format to Amazon.

Billboard is reporting that Sony BMG will follow suit in January.

DRM is dead on music files and it hasn’t even been two years since Dave Goldberg was the first person “in the industry” to have the balls to say it was over. Please tell me we don’t have to go through this same bullshit for video.

UPDATE: I just checked and yes, you can get the entire Led Zeppelin catalog in MP3 format, so I’d say they’re serious about putting the whole catalog in. When they released the Zep catalog on iTunes for $100 I asked my friend at Rhino, “DRM free or am I going to have to spend the whole weekend burning/ripping?” In the end I decided to save my $100. Now that they’re in MP3 format, I just bought the first 8 LPs from Amazon (skipped Coda, Song Remains the Same, BBC Sessions, and How The West Was Won). The only thing I had in my non-vinyl collection was the two “Remasters” discs. Will be good to finally have the whole catalog (downloading now).

UPDATE 2: And now, an hour later, I have the Zep collection in my wall (see here for more info on the Control 4 setup I have). No burning, ripping, way less hassle than if I’d have bought from iTunes.

UPDATE 3: Sorry, just need to say one more thing here — if you are someone who stood in the way of DRM free music over the last 8 years, please consider firing yourself. I’m serious. Imagine if you’d have made it this easy for me to drop $80 on your music and enjoy it in my living room digitally 8 years ago. Imagine spending the last 8 years fighting piracy with superior products instead of in the courts. Imagine. You just wasted 8 years of opportunity, only to find yourself with EXACTLY the solution that was suggested then. Get out of the way and let the new business emerge before you make similarly behind-the-times decisions tomorrow. We’re fifteen years into this Internet thing and by now you either get it or you don’t. If you don’t, and you’re killing your company with decisions like “we must have DRM or we’re dead” you don’t get it and are probably hurting the company you work for. I am not trying to be mean, but I’m completely serious. It’s nothing personal against anyone in particular at all (in fact I personally like many of the people who might take offense at this), just frustration over the amount of money wasted and opportunity lost as we’ve been fighting this pointless battle, only to end up at what was obviously the logical conclusion all along. I don’t want to hear the “yeah, but” come out of your mouth. You were wrong.

UPDATE 4: The Sony BMG news is finally public. It’s gone. Amazon has all four majors. Ding. Dong. Salon points out the irony.

ian

Trackbacks & Pings

Open Media Web « thund3rbox on 07 Jan 2008 at 12:40 pm

[...] He touches on a lot of thought that he has been stating in his blog over the years, including how DRM doesn’t work, media companies need to embrace the open web, not create a false scarcity and for everyone to push [...]

Comments

Phillip Kerman wrote:

I think it’s fair to say we WILL go through the same deal with video. So far anyway, all signs point to yes.

I wish there was a way to maintain a music library the didn’t require that you become a librarian. What do non-computer geeks do when their hard drive crashes or they upgrade? I’m not saying I want to tote around 100s of CD cases, but I sure do like the idea that I can go and re-rip stuff I “own”… or just never go through the process of copying content to different media.

Plus, what’s up with iTunes selling 128kbps rips? I can definitely hear the difference between a CD or .flac and an MP3 from amazon (256kbps). This isn’t a super huge issue but you’d think audiophile geeks would care.

Anyway, I hope all these indicators you point to are true.

Posted 29 Dec 2007 at 3:04 pm ¶
Tracy wrote:

I have a “friend” that has been downloading music in the MP3 format for about a decade now. It is about time that “my friend” will be able to do the right thing and pay for the music that they like in the format that they like. Best of all, no absurd premium price above the now-standard $.99 to buy it in the MP3 format. Sure, there are better encoding formats, but this is a giant step in the right direction. I also know that Amazon wasn’t the first to go MP3, but they are a big player that shows that it can be done. Rest in Hell.wma DRM.

Posted 29 Dec 2007 at 3:26 pm ¶
josh schrei wrote:

fuck the majesticons!

Posted 29 Dec 2007 at 4:54 pm ¶
Daniel Raffel wrote:

Better late than never, this is a great step in the right direction! It’s just a shame it took so long (and ended up being a defensive mood made out of fear.) Hope to see some innovative practices start to take shape that make the industry more efficient for consumers.

Posted 29 Dec 2007 at 8:10 pm ¶
Travis Keller wrote:

SHIT YEAH!

Posted 31 Dec 2007 at 9:24 pm ¶
Phillip Kerman wrote:

I’ve been thinking about your statements for a while and I’m not 100% I get your point or totally believe it.

iTunes and Zune’s music source (whatever it’s called) and many other music sources still do DRM… and they don’t appear to be dead yet. So, my question is are you just saying the hurdle has been reached and it’s just a matter of time before DRM is dead? Or, it’s just looking like the tide has turned or what?

It’s not just wishful thinking is it? Or is that part of it?

Posted 06 Jan 2008 at 12:05 pm ¶
iancr wrote:

Good question, Phillip.

I’m not saying DRM shouldn’t exist, I’m just saying it shouldn’t be *mandated*. It’s fine if iTunes and Zune want to continue to use DRM. They both do a pretty good job of making it appear seamless for the user. But the consumer now has a choice to purchase a file that works in more than a closed ecosystem. Let the market sort it out. That’s what free markets are all about.

ian

Posted 06 Jan 2008 at 1:53 pm ¶
Phillip Kerman wrote:

Looks like Sony/BMG will sell through amazon too.

The more I look at this whole issue the less I understand. My head started hurting when I learned that you can buy 256kpbs tracks without DRM for a premium price at iTunes but the 128kpbs tracks are cheaper. To me, this indicates that DRM is anti-customer. If it were intended to protect the content, then they’d be protecting the higher quality encodes. Odd.

Posted 11 Jan 2008 at 11:49 pm ¶

FISTFULAYEN